


The Gambler's Family

by Setcheti



Series: The Gambler's Heart [7]
Category: Bonanza, House 2: The Second Story, The Magnificent Seven (TV)
Genre: Aftermath of Violence, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-08-29
Updated: 2014-08-29
Packaged: 2018-02-15 07:57:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2221434
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Setcheti/pseuds/Setcheti
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Maude Standish returns to Four Corners, but she isn't alone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

_Gonna_ _make it, gonna make it, almost there…_

Across the street from the hotel, a woman talking to two others in front of the dry-goods store spotted the black-clad man easing his way along the boardwalk and frowned. “If you ladies will excuse me,” she said politely. “It seems there is somethin’ I must attend to.”

Chris didn’t see her coming until it was too late and the small, scowling woman was blocking his path into the hotel. “Mistah Larabee! What exactly do you think you’re doin’? I do not believe for one moment that you’ve been released from the clinic!”

He almost smiled; Ezra was right, she did look like a hissing kitten when she was angry. He did his best to look intimidating. “I’m going to get some breakfast, Mrs. Standish. Now if you’ll kindly move…”

His best obviously wasn’t enough. A slender hand grasped the ends of his bolo tie and pulled, drawing him down closer to her level; the other hand gently touched his forehead, then his cheek. Indigo eyes darkened with concern, and she shook her head as she released him. “Clinic. Now.”

“After I eat.”

“ _Now_ , Chris.” Her expression softened slightly as those delicate hands began pushing him in the direction she wanted him to go. “I’ll bring you some breakfast.” He still resisted, and she sighed. “I’ll bring you French toast…but only if you go back to bed.”

This time he did smile; as ludicrous as it might seem considering her size and age, Juliet had slipped into a mothering role with regards to the six lawmen her husband rode with—a position none of them had realized needed to be filled until it already was. Chris had been worried before that, unsure what effect the marriage of one of the Seven would have on the group as a whole, but none of the complications he’d feared had ever arisen. As a matter of fact, the presence of a loving, caring woman in their midst seemed to be having a settling effect on the seven volatile men, for which their leader was exceedingly grateful.

And of course it didn’t hurt that she was willing to make his favorite breakfast just to get him back into his hated sickbed in the clinic. Pretending a put-upon attitude that he didn’t really feel, Chris offered the small woman his arm to cross the dusty street, seeing the twinkle in her eye that said she knew what he was up to. He shook his head. “I’m not sure if I should be envying Ez or pitying him.”

“Definitely pitying,” was the amused reply. Any comment he might have made was drowned out by the clatter of the arriving stage behind them, something neither of them gave much attention to. The familiar voice that cut through the dry air moments later spun them both around, though; Larabee’s expression one of surprise and Juliet’s of dismay. “Mother Standish!” she exclaimed softly.

Chris put a comforting hand over the smaller one that had briefly tightened on his arm. “You didn’t know she was coming?”

“Not this time.” They both stood in front of the clinic and listened as the demanding Southern voice that hadn’t been heard in Four Corners in six months ordered special care to be taken of the luggage as it was unloaded. “Thank goodness Ezra is out on patrol; she must have been tryin’ to take him by surprise. Perhaps ah can find out what she wants before he returns.”

The tall gunslinger’s opinion of Ezra’s marriage went up another notch at the quietly spoken words; even he would think twice about tangling with Maude when she was obviously up to something. _Ezra, you are one lucky bastard_ , he thought admiringly. _Not just any woman would take on your mother for you—especially after the scene she made at your wedding._ He patted the small hand again. “Nathan may need your help today, you know. He has a difficult patient to take care of, one that always gives him lots of trouble.”

“One that needs to get back up those stairs and into bed if he wants his breakfast.” Her hand slipped from beneath his, but the small smile she turned on him showed her gratitude for his offer. “Quickly, Mr. Larabee, before ah forget how much you like powdered sugar.”

He was tipping his hat in grinning surrender when his attention was caught by a young woman stepping away from the stage with Maude. Something about her seemed familiar…he felt more than saw Juliet turning back to see what he was looking at and almost jumped at her sudden sharp intake of breath. “What is it?”

No answer, but she took an unsteady step backward and might have fallen if he hadn’t been there. The abrupt change from confident lawman’s wife to frightened girl hit him hard; her indigo eyes were wide as saucers in her suddenly pale face, unblinkingly fastened on her mother-in-law’s companion. Her mouth soundlessly formed a single word…

Chris suddenly realized why the young woman with Maude looked so familiar; it was the escaped Baxter sister. Without another moment’s thought, he grabbed Juliet and propelled her up the stairs and into the clinic. “Nathan!”

The dark healer was already at his side. “What happened?”

To both men’s surprise, Juliet answered him. “It was Catie,” she whispered. “It was Catie, she came back…”

The small woman started to shake, and Nathan quickly sat her down in his rocking chair and wrapped a blanket around her shoulders. “You jus’ take it easy,” he said soothingly. “You’re safe in here.” He picked up one small hand and rubbed it gently. “She’s cold as ice, Chris. You sure it was that Baxter girl?”

“It was her,” Chris confirmed, slumping down on the cot he’d snuck away from not that long ago and shutting his eyes; his head was spinning. “Oh God, Nate, why didn’t I recognize her? She was standing right there next to Maude…”

“You didn’t recognize her because you’re still fightin’ a fever from that sickness that’s goin’ around, Chris,” the healer scolded. “You ain’t exactly a hundred percent right now—and besides, why would you expect Ezra’s mother to be travelin’ with someone who’s out to kill his wife…” His words gave them both the same idea, but the healer’s strong hands kept Larabee from standing back up. “No, now you just stay right here—you can keep an eye on Miz Julie while I go round up the others, ‘cause she sure don’t need to be left alone after a shock like that. And it may all just be a misunderstandin’. Maude might not know…”

Slightly glazed turquoise eyes bored angrily up into his concerned brown ones. “You don’t believe that.”

Nathan shook his head, giving Juliet one more concerned look before heading for the door. “Nope, but I’d like to. I’ll be right back, don’t y’all go anywhere.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it.” Chris closed his eyes again. His head was spinning, and not just because of his fever. “Don’t want her to forget the powdered sugar.”

 

Nathan might have put up a good show for Chris, but he burst into the jail almost as violently as the gunslinger had kicked his way into the clinic. “Buck! JD! We’ve got trouble!” Both men shot to their feet. Nathan gulped in air, trying to push back his panic. “Maude just got in on the stage, Chris says she’s got that Baxter girl with her.”

Buck’s face drained of color. “We’ve got to warn Miz Julie…”

Nathan caught his arm before he could reach the door. “She’s at the clinic with Chris, Buck.” He took a deep breath. “When is Ez due back from patrol?”

JD checked his watch; he’d taken over the patrol schedule while Chris was laid up. “Any time now. Is Miz Julie okay?”

“She could be better—gave her a bad shock when she saw that girl with Maude,” the healer answered grimly. “Chris was almost in a panic when he brought her in, blamin’ himself for not recognizin’ who Maude had with her.” The worry lines on his face deepened. “He don’t think it’s a coincidence them two are travelin’ together.”

“Neither do I,” Buck replied unhappily. He gathered himself together, planning. “JD, go round up the others double quick. Nate, you go on back to the clinic with Chris and Miz Julie—we’ll all meet up there to decide what to do next.”

 

A few miles to the north, Ezra smiled as he came within sight of the town; his patrol had been dusty, hot and boring…but he had something to look forward to at the end of it, and that made everything else negligible. It felt so good to have a home again, to have a loving wife waiting for him. He remembered several months previous when an attempt to dodge a bullet during a gunfight had knocked him out of his saddle and brought him to an up close and personal encounter with an unyielding rock. Normally the first thing he would have seen on regaining consciousness would have been Nathan and his hated clinic, but on that occasion he’d been stunned to awaken in his own bed in his own house and under the tender care of his own very worried wife. And he’d liked it—not worrying Juliet, of course, but having a place to be taken to, a place where he belonged and could feel completely safe…

…A place where he was loved. A smile graced his handsome face, lighting up his green eyes. Oh yes, he was loved. And, he loved in return. The world was a much brighter place to Ezra Standish these days.

The streets were quiet as he rode into town, and he decided to stop and see the wife he’d been thinking about before heading over to the jail to report to Buck. Not that he had all that much to report anyway, since it had been just as quiet outside of town as it was inside. Ezra put up Orpheus in the small stable he’d built on the north side of his property and then slipped in through the screened kitchen door, expecting to find Juliet there. She wasn’t, but there was a pan of something set to rise under a towel on the back shelf of the stove and some vegetables were laid out on the counter next to a scrub brush and a knife. He was just about to assume that his wife had stepped out momentarily when the sound of a strange feminine voice from the front parlor reached his ears…and was answered by an older woman’s voice that was all too familiar to him. Angry and worried now, Ezra checked his guns and then left the kitchen for the parlor.

His mother greeted him with a professionally pleasant smile. “Ezra, my dear boy! We were just wonderin’ when you’d be comin’ home. And where is your lovely bride? It was quite rude of you to not have us met at the stage, you know, or at the very least to have been awaitin’ us here at the house.”

Ezra’s frown became a scowl; the second half of the ‘us’ was a young woman he’d recognized immediately, even though she was now dressed very properly and fashionably and her still-short black hair was held back with a ribbon instead of sticking up in spikes all over her head. “I can arrange to have your companion met at the jail,” he answered. “In fact, we’ve been awaitin’ _her_ return for some time, she’ll receive quite the enthusiastic reception once the good townspeople realize she’s finally arrived.” He gave a short, sarcastic bow. “I don’t suppose you’d care to accompany me peacefully, Miss Baxter?”

“You are just _so_ amusing, Mr. Standish,” Catie simpered at him, and he recognized the signs of his mother’s training in the girl with more than a little disgust. “But you didn’t answer your mother’s question, you know. I have missed dear little Juliet so much since I left her here, and I just can’t wait to see her again. We have so much to talk about, so much… _history_ we share that really ought to be discussed.”

Ezra actually took a step back – not from the girl, but from the knowing glitter in his mother’s eyes at the innuendo-laden statement. “You…she _told_ you?” he questioned. “You know about them, about where they’re from?”

Maude’s expression hardened, by which Ezra assumed that she hadn’t been certain _he_ was cognizant of those particular details of his wife’s background. “You’ve been holdin’ out on me, Ezra. Accordin’ to Miss Caitlin here your little marital acquisition has quite a past…or should I say, a _future_? Just when were you plannin’ on sharin’ all this valuable foreknowledge with me, son?”

“Nevah,” Standish spat, his expression equally compounded of disgust and disbelief. “And if you’re tellin’ me that you came here knowin’ what this hellion wanted with mah wife her first time through the area, Mothah, then _nevah_ is also the next time you will be welcome in mah home.”

Catie giggled, and Maude shook her head disapprovingly. Her voice turned icy and threatening. “Now you listen to me, you disrespectful, ungrateful, disappointin’ child! For whatever misguided sentimental reason, you have managed to lay claim to a most valuable opportunity and I am not goin’ to stand idly by and watch you waste it! Now you can either make up your mind to come with Miss Caitlin and I to a place where we can better exploit this resource, or you can stay here in this dung-heap of a town with those six worthless killers you call friends and wonder what you’re missin’. The choice is yours.”

Ezra’s voice was rough with tightly controlled rage. “You’ll take my wife ovah my dead body!”

“That sounded like choice number two,” Catie said happily, bouncing to her feet and completely ignoring the gun pointed at her. “I can see why you’re disappointed, Miss Maude; I find it hard to believe this soft fool is actually your son.”

“Yes, I know, dear. It really is disgraceful.”

The words didn’t really upset Ezra—he’d heard them countless times before—but the gun that suddenly appeared in his mother’s hand honestly took him by surprise. “Mothah, you can’t be serious!”

Maude just shook her head. “You really are bein’ disgustingly melodramatic about this, Ezra P. It’s just business, after all.”

“Like settin’ bounty hunters on Mr. Tanner was just business?” Ezra’s voice was flat. “And the boy you tried to have hung at Fort Laramie, and the rat poison that was administered to me? Your business seems to be a rather deadly one.”

“If someone gets in your way you have to get them out of it,” Catie smirked at him primly. “By whatever means are most expedient.”

Ezra just looked at her for a long moment, recognizing the source of the words, and then he nodded. “So you do,” he replied…and then he triggered his derringer and fired.

 

After going up to the clinic to talk out the situation with the others, Buck had returned to the jail and settled himself outside on the porch to wait for Ezra – who he knew should have been back by now. Worry had strung his nerves tight, and so the sound of gunfire had him off the porch and halfway down the street before he consciously registered moving at all. The door to Ezra’s tidy home flew open just as he drew near and a familiar figure stumbled backwards off the porch and wound up sprawled on the ground, clutching his right arm while trying to aim his gun into the house. “Ezra!”

Ezra’s head snapped around, seeing the ladies’ man running towards him followed at a distance by Vin, JD and Josiah. “She’s after Juliet!” he yelled back. “Don’t let her get away!”

The four men expected he was speaking of the Baxter girl, and so were taken absolutely by surprise when Ezra’s mother stepped out of the open door, looked around, and then ran straight for Josiah. “Oh, Mr. Sanchez, it was so horrible!”

“NO! Josiah, she’s the one who shot me!”

Maude stopped in her tracks, staring at the large gun pointed her way in disbelief. “Mr. Sanchez, my son is confused! His wound, you know. It was that girl, she worked her way into my confidence, told me that my daughter-in-law was not all that she seemed. I came here to protect Ezra…”

“Which of course explains why you broke into mah house in mah absence.” Buck was helping Ezra to his feet; the gambler’s green eyes were flinty, his jaw set. “As well as this inconvenient hole in mah arm. Ah suppose ah should be thankful you weren’t aimin’ for mah heart?”

She ignored him. “Mr. Sanchez… _Josiah_ , surely you don’t believe…”

“I believe,” the large man rumbled ominously, “that _my boy_ has been through enough because of you, and I won’t be allowin’ it to go on anymore.”   His icy blue eyes never left her face.   “Son, get up to the clinic and let Nathan fix that arm; we’ll take it from here.”

Ezra sagged a little against Buck’s support, relief showing in his face as the older man took charge of the situation. “Yes suh,” he said softly, allowing himself to be led away.

A small smile quirked the corner of Josiah’s mouth and just as quickly disappeared. “Vin?” he called out. “What about the Baxter girl?”

The long-haired tracker emerged from the house smiling, a smaller body draped over his shoulder. “She ain’t dead,” he called back as he carefully pulled the door shut behind him. “JD, you’d best wire Washington to send Gordon and West our way; I’m right sure they’ll be wantin’ these two prisoners in Federal custody as soon as possible.”

“Federal…!”

“Federal.” Chris had come up behind Josiah, smiling grimly at the Southern conwoman’s confusion. “By rights this falls under their jurisdiction, not ours—that little animal you brought with you is wanted by half the territory _and_ the Secret Service. And don’t tell me you didn’t know that your daughter-in-law’s uncle is _Agent_ Gordon, one of Grant’s most trusted men?” He shook his head at her look of openmouthed shock. “Maverick was right, Maude, you’re gettin’ soft.”

“Or maybe just greedy,” Vin chimed in, shifting the burden on his shoulder. “What’cha doin’ out of the clinic, Chris?”

“I wanted in on this. And Nate has his hands full right now.” He jerked his head at the body Vin was carrying. “Little bitch got the drop on Ezra, huh?”

The tracker scowled, shooting a hateful look at Maude. “Naw, the big one did.”

 

It took some time to get Maude and Catie secured in the jail, and then Nathan had to be fetched down from where he was seeing to Ezra in the clinic in order to tend to the Baxter girl’s wound. “She’ll live,” he told the other men once he’d finished and let them back into the jail, having shooed everyone but Josiah outside for propriety’s sake while he took care of things. “Ez wasn’t shootin’ to kill, but the bullet hit bone and she might not have much in the way of usin’ that arm any more.”

That didn’t seem to worry anyone all too much. “How is Ez?” Buck wanted to know. “I know it didn’t look like a bad one…”

“It wasn’t.” Nathan cast a sidelong, disapproving glance at Maude, who’d had the entire time he was in the jail to ask after her son and hadn’t – and who didn’t look any too interested now, either. “Just tore through the muscle, he’ll heal up just fine so long as he don’t overdo things for a week or so.”

“Miz Julie won’t let him.” Chris was sure about that. He turned his attention to Maude, turquoise eyes narrowing. “So what was it going to be, Maude? Kidnapping or blackmail?”

The Southern conwoman drew herself up haughtily. “The only crime bein’ perpetrated here is your unlawful detainment of my person. I came here to visit my son and his new wife, Mistah Larabee. Along the way I happened to encounter Miss Caitlin, who claimed to be an old acquaintance of my new daughter-in-law’s, and so we finished off the last part of our journey together.”

“Yeah, and then once you got here you decided to break into his house and shoot him,” Vin drawled from where he’d perched himself on the edge of the desk. He smiled at her disdainful look. “It don’t matter now how nice a story you can tell, ma’am; it was your gun shot Ezra and we know it, and we also know that he wasn’t expectin’ you and that no one was home when you went into his house. Sounds like a whole lot of lawbreakin’ to me, and all of it yours.”

“Not to mention that I warned you last year not to come back to Four Corners,” JD reminded her with a folded-armed glare that looked eerily like Chris Larabee’s. “If you hadn’t done anything else but show up I would have just run you out on the next stage, but after all this…well, Miss Maude, you’re gonna have to stay here in the jail until the men they’re sendin’ out from Washington show up and decide what to do with you.” He nodded at Chris’ raised eyebrow. “They answered my message while I was still in the telegraph office. Gordon and his partner can’t get away to come themselves, but President Grant is sending someone else just as fast as he can.”

Maude’s firm self-composure faltered for a moment. “President Grant? You can’t be serious.”

“Oh yes he can.” Chris smiled at her sudden look of shock, shaking his head. “Maybe the soft you’re gettin’ to be is really just soft in the head; Gordon and his connections aside, I know for a fact that Miz Julie’s brother had a few words of his own with you after the wedding, and it was Judge Travis himself who put you on the stage the next day and told you that maybe this part of the country wasn’t any to good for your continuin’ health.”

“Just a lot of talk,” the conwoman blustered. “I admit I was a bit…precipitate when I arrived at the weddin’, gentlemen, but that was only due to mah fear that Ezra was makin’ yet another mistake.” She dabbed at her eyes. “Such a stubborn boy, and rather unbalanced as well. Ah was thinkin’ of the girl’s welfare as well as his own…”

“So I guess that kidnappin’ his wife seemed to you to be a good way to protect her from Ez, now that makes sense,” Buck commented sarcastically. “Got an excuse for shootin’ him too?”

Maude sniffed. “He drew his weapon – and as I said before, although it shames me to admit it, my son is unbalanced and therefore quite unpredictable. I only resorted to usin’ my own gun out of self-defense.”

“Sounds good,” Vin said, nodding thoughtfully. “ ‘Course, it would sound a lot better if you hadn’t already tried to tell us you came out here to save Ez from Miz Julie because of somethin’ that Baxter girl told you.” His blue eyes sparked with a hard, dark humor, and he winked at her. “Got to keep them stories straight, you know – blows the whole con if you get ‘em mixed up.”

“It don’t help any when you try to run the con on people who know better in the first place, either,” Buck added helpfully. When Maude snorted her contempt of that, though – or maybe just of him – the ladies’ man’s dark blue eyes narrowed. “Or when you show up in the company of someone who’s got half the men in these parts stockin’ up on rope.”

“That’s all we need is a double lynchin’ – Travis would never let us live it down. So we should probably keep two men on watch until Grant’s men get here,” Chris observed. He was already moving toward the door. “We’ll work out the schedule tonight, might have to pull in some of the Slash Five boys to help out.”

Maude was doing her best to look unconcerned, but when the rest of the men made to follow Chris the mask dropped. “Wait…where do you gentlemen think you’re goin’? Didn’t you just say…”

At first she thought no one was going to answer her, but then JD turned just before going out the door…and smiled. “Sure did – say that, I mean,” he confirmed. “But right now not too many folks know you’re in here…or _why_ you’re in here either, so I guess you’d best be stayin’ put and keepin’ quiet until someone gets back to watch the jail. Lynch mob is awful hard to stop once it gets started.” And with that he tipped his hat to her and followed the other men, closing the door behind him…although it didn’t escape Maude’s notice that he hadn’t locked it.

She might have felt better about that if she’d realized that both Josiah and JD had stayed outside on the porch to keep watch, but making the conwoman feel better hadn’t been on any of the men’s minds – just the opposite, in fact. After some whispered instructions and a lot of grinning and quiet back-slapping, Chris and Buck followed Nathan back to the clinic to check on Ezra.

The healer had been hoping that he could get Chris to stay in the clinic once they were back there, but as soon as he had eased open the door he knew the gunslinger would be resting in his room at the boarding house instead. Juliet was kneeling on Nathan’s narrow bed, her slender arms wrapped tightly around her husband; Ezra’s face was pressed hard against her shoulder, his shoulders shaking with the release of silent tears. A thick bandage was visible through the ripped, bloody sleeve of his white linen shirt, and his right hand was gripped into a white-knuckled fist around a handful of his wife’s blue skirt. The raw anguish that radiated from the two of them hit Chris like a physical blow, and he staggered slightly when Nathan pulled him back and shut the door. “Are you sure he’ll be all right?” he whispered.

The healer just shook his head, tugging the unsteady gunslinger back down the stairs. “I hope so,” he answered in kind. “I ain’t never seen nothin’ like this happen, though; I can’t even imagine what he must be feelin’ right now.”

“He has Miz Julie,” Buck stated firmly. “He has all of us. Ez ain’t alone anymore, he’ll be okay.”

“Yeah, you’re right, Buck,” Chris agreed. “But I don’t think I will be until that bitch who calls herself his mother is out of our town and out of his life for good.”


	2. Chapter 2

Washington was a long way from Four Corners, and even though there were agents closer than that it was still a week before Grant’s men arrived to take custody of Catie Baxter and Maude Standish. It had been an exceptionally long week for the town’s lawmen, a time during which the jail had to be guarded ceaselessly and trouble seemed to be constantly brewing in the streets and in the saloon – trouble that was somehow always aimed in the direction of the jail.

People had seen Maude get off the stage, and some had even noticed that she’d had a companion with her. No one had recognized the escaped Baxter sister at that point, most of the residents of the town never having actually laid eyes on her, but the flurry of telegrams between Four Corners and Washington that took place afterwards had turned speculation into cold knowing.   No one had to be told that Maude Standish had brought the outlaw girl with her, and no one much cared which of the two had shot the town’s resident gambler. They just wanted to see the pair of them hanged on the little-used gallows that stood just outside of the main part of town.

Luckily, no one was willing to hurt one of the town’s other lawmen to do it. But Chris Larabee knew that all it would take was one opening, just a few unguarded minutes, for the matter to be out of their hands…and swinging. And by the end of the week, he was just about ready to provide that opening himself.

After a few more attempts to get some kind of story straight and make someone believe it, Maude had gone quiet and stayed that way. Part of her silence was doubtless due to the realization that the entire town wanted her dead, of course, but some may have been from shock due to the behavior of her cellmate; being injured and helpless had ripped away whatever thin veneer of civilized behavior Catie Baxter had gained under the conwoman’s tutelage, and she was, as had been said of her so many times before, completely rabid. If the girl had cried or been in any way pitiable she might have found some sympathy - enough to stop the lynching attempts, anyway. But she didn’t cry. Instead she cursed and yelled and screamed out threats until Josiah and Nathan gagged her, and then she just lay there and glared at anyone who happened to stray into her field of vision, black eyes as cold and glittering as any snake’s.

Josiah’s professional opinion, both as lawman and as preacher, was that she was just plain evil. He was willing to offer no opinion about Maude, save that he thought sitting there under the black weight of her former protégé’s insane gaze might have just brought home to her how big this last mistake of her career had been. She had, they’d discovered, spent most of the winter in Denver with Catie, gleefully grooming her to play the role Ezra had been refusing his entire life. She had even, sickeningly, told many people there that the girl was her daughter.

Chris had a professional opinion of his own after finding that out; he said that the two of them deserved each other and that a double hanging was most likely the best thing for them. He didn’t let it happen, though, in spite of the fact that he wanted to – a fact which he shared with the two government agents who finally arrived to take custody of Maude and Catie. The agents, for their part, didn’t seem concerned about it; their prisoners were still alive, that was all that mattered to them. They interviewed each of the Seven and several of the townspeople as well regarding what had gone on, sent word back to Washington that Gordon’s niece and her husband were all right, and then secured their prisoners in a private hired stagecoach and headed off to meet a train bound for Washington.

Six of the peacekeepers arranged themselves in front of the jail for the departure, as much to ensure that any spontaneous six-gun justice was held at bay as to reassure themselves that the two women were actually gone.   Ezra, however, did not stand with them. The gambler leaned on the rail in front of the saloon, his face expressionless, and watched the stage until it was out of sight …and then he turned and went back inside, alone.

 

Once the two women were gone, things went back to normal for almost everyone. Almost. A week went by, then several more, and it was nearly a month after that when Vin decided he was tired of the situation and volunteered himself to go out on a long patrol with Ezra. Chris hadn’t wanted to let Ezra go on the patrol at all, had in fact been ready to refuse to let the gambler take _any_ more patrols at all, but Vin was insistent and the gunslinger had learned to trust his friend’s judgment – especially where Ezra was concerned.

They rode out early the next morning, and Vin kept himself to a bare minimum of necessary conversation for the first half of their ride. He knew Ezra, and he knew his silence would eventually force the man to ask him to talk. All he had to do was wait for Ezra’s curiosity to boil over.

He didn’t have to wait long. Just about an hour past noon the pregnant silence gave birth to a question. “Mr. Tanner? What was it you wanted to speak with me about?”

The tracker hid his smile. “What happened to ‘Vin’? ‘Friends use first names’, ya know.”

Ezra blinked at him for a minute and then almost smiled himself.   “Sorry, Vin, my mind was elsewhere. But I can tell you have somethin’ you want to say, and I have the feelin’ you deliberately chose to ride patrol with me today on purpose to say it.”

“Yep.” Vin pulled Peso’s head around so they were facing the gambler. “Didn’t want no audience for this, didn’t think you’d appreciate it much—ain’t sure you’re gonna appreciate it too much anyways.”

“That sounds intriguing.” Ezra raised an eyebrow. “Pray continue.”

“Got a question for ya,” Vin said seriously. “What I want ta know is, when are you gonna stop punishin’ Miz Julie for your mother bein’ a snake?”

Ezra jerked like he’d been shot, and from the expression on his face he might as well have been. “What on earth are you talking about? Ah haven’t been…”

“Oh yes you have,” Vin interrupted relentlessly. “You don’t go home much nights anymore, and ya volunteer for anything that’ll take you out of town—and when you are with her, you’re just…goin’ through the motions.” He walked his mount up closer to Ezra’s and looked the shocked man in the eye.   “You know, JD asked her one day when he was over there helpin’ with the chickens if everything was okay, and she said it had been such a horrible experience that it was just gonna take time for things to get back to normal. It’s been a damn near a month now, Ez; just how long _is_ it gonna take?”

The other man’s mouth had fallen open, but there was a touch of anger gleaming in his eyes. “Why did Mistah Dunne feel the need to ask mah wife such a question?”

“’Cause he’s your friend and he was worried about her—she’s gettin’ skinny again, Ez, an’ she’s too quiet.” Vin spat in the dust off the left side of his horse.   “Here’s the way it looks to me:   your ma were right unhappy ‘bout you gettin’ married again. Them Baxter girls knew all about us, stands to reason they knew all about your ma, too—hell, that Catie told Miz Julie as much when they took her last summer, seemed to think ol’ Maude was somethin’ purty special from the sound of it. So Catie gets away from us an’ hooks up with your ma, knowin’ that once she tells Maude all about everything the woman won’t rest until she’s made your life a livin’ hell over it.”   Taking a chance, he reached out and grasped Ezra’s arm – the one his mother had put a bullet in – giving him a little shake. “Dammit, Ez, you’re lettin’ them two bitches win! They’d be laughin’ fit to bust if they could see how you’re lettin’ ‘em mess up your life!”

Reality came crashing in on the gambler, breaking through the walls he’d built over the past month to keep the pain of his mother’s final betrayal at bay. He caught at the sleeve of Vin’s coat, his expression stricken. “Oh my lord, what have ah done?” he whispered. “Ah didn’t mean to…”

“I know you didn’t,” Vin reassured him calmly. “And Miz Julie knows it too, that’s one understandin’ little woman.”

“Too understandin’,” Ezra groaned. “Ah don’t believe ah didn’t catch on when it started happenin’…” He answered the question before the tracker had to ask it. “The nightmares, Vin, she was havin’ nightmares; ah wasn’t the only one fightin’ mah demons after that horrid incident. Ah kept wakin’ up alone, and the next mornin’ there’d be all kinds of bakin’ and cleanin’ done…but she nevah said a word about it, not one word.”

“Probably didn’t want to worry you, thought you had enough on your mind.”

“Ah should have seen it,” Ezra said, shaking his head in self-disgust.   “Ah should have asked. She’s been there for me this whole time, ah should have been there for her as well.”

“You’re gonna be there now,” Vin told him firmly, shaking him again. “Like I said, she’s a real understandin’ little woman, it ain’t too late to go home and grovel a little—hell, she might even enjoy it!”

Ezra laughed in spite of himself. “No, mah friend, ah believe you’re confusin’ mah marriage with the relationship Mrs. Travis has with Chris—or the one Buck has with Miss Meg. Juliet would most likely burst into tears and beg _my_ forgiveness if ah tried such a tactic with her.”

That made Vin laugh too.   He released his grip and slapped his friend’s shoulder. “Yep, I could see that happenin’…but of course that would make ya grovel even more, right?” Suddenly he stiffened, looking back down the road over Ezra’s shoulder.   “Rider comin’.”

Ezra wheeled Orpheus around so the chestnut stood shoulder to shoulder with Peso. “Ridin’ in hard, too.”

“Yep.” Both men had drawn their guns, not sure what to expect. Then Vin squinted.   “Hey, that’s JD!” In a heartbeat both guns were holstered again and both horses were galloping to meet the young sheriff. “JD!” Vin called as soon as they were in range. “Did somethin’ happen in town?”

JD reigned to a halt right in front of them, patting Chelsea’s neck in silent apology for the hard ride. “I’ve been lookin’ for you two for an hour, wasn’t sure what trail you took,” he panted, whipping off his hat and running a hand through his sweaty hair. “Ez, it’s Miz Julie…”

All the color drained out of the gambler’s face; Vin caught his arm again to make sure he stayed on his horse. “Easy, pard. What happened, JD?”

“Josiah found her in the church garden, they think she must’ve got too much sun. He took her home and Miz Travis went to help him.” JD took a deep breath. “He said to come find you right away…and to make sure you came back with me.”

Ezra flinched. “You all thought ah’d…”

“No, nobody’d ‘ve thought that of you, Ez.” Vin used his hold on the other man to shake him. “Josiah was just scared and shootin’ off at the mouth, he’d never for a minute think you’d _not_ come home for Miz Julie and you know it.” Even though he knew he was most likely right about that, though, he tracker made a note to himself that he’d just stay close to Josiah for a while, just to make sure that the big preacher’s tendency to shoot off his mouth didn’t happen in front of Ezra. They’d just about gotten the last rift within the Seven closed, this wasn’t the time to let another one crack open. He gave his friend one last shake and then let go of him. “Come on, let’s get back an’ find out what’s goin’ on.”

The gambler nodded jerkily, and then kicked his horse into motion and shot off down the road. JD turned worried brown eyes to Vin. “Nathan’s still up at the village, Vin.”

“I know.” The influenza outbreak of the month before had been a mild one in Four Corners and the surrounding towns, but in other places the people hadn’t been so lucky. And then it had started up in the Indian village south of town, and Nathan had ridden out to see what he could do. That had been two days past, and even if he hadn’t been needed where he was no one – least of all Chris – would be willing to risk sending someone after him and in doing so risk bringing the sickness back to town. Vin shook his head.   “C’mon, don’t want to let him get too far ahead.”

He kicked his horse into a gallop, followed by JD, hoping that what they found in town would be nothing more than a case of an over-industrious little wife spending too much time out under the hot desert sun.

 

Ezra was vaguely aware that Vin and JD were riding somewhere behind him, but he wasn’t paying much attention to them; his attention was focused inward and sharp with self-recrimination. A month. He’d been neglecting his wife for a month, and now before he could make amends…

No, it just couldn’t be so much too late as that.

Ezra startled more than one person – and more than one hand reached for the nearest gun – when he and Orpheus came thundering into town.   Neither of them noticed; in fact, had anyone been in the street Ezra would most likely have ridden them down and never looked back. As it was he didn’t even look back at Orpheus once he had vaulted from the horse’s back and dashed up the front steps of the neat little house.

But at the front door, his hand on the knob, Ezra hesitated. The last time he’d used this door had been a month ago, when he’d staggered backwards out of it and fallen off the whitewashed porch with one of his mother’s bullets burning in his arm…and with the sure, sickening knowledge that her next one, if fired, would be targeted someplace more vital if he could not get himself in view of witnesses.   Ezra had never in his life been so glad to see anyone as he had been to see Buck that day…unless it was to see his frightened but otherwise unscathed wife in Nathan’s clinic immediately afterwards.

It was the thought of his wife that turned the knob. Ezra entered the house silently, and the house was silent in answer save for the ticking of the pendulum clock Juliet’s brother Jesse had given to them as a wedding present the year before. No voices sounded from the kitchen or the parlor, where they would have been if his wife were all right, and with mounting trepidation he began to ascend the stairs. He did not call out to see if anyone was upstairs, unwilling to startle his wife if she by chance was resting…and unwilling to risk finding that his presence was unwelcome if she wasn’t alone. Halfway up the stairs he heard the murmur of a woman’s voice which quickly resolved itself into the scolding tones of Mary Travis.   “…scared everyone half to death and you’re not going to do it again. You lay right back down.”

“Mary, this is ridiculous! I just overheated, you’re all making a big fuss over nothing! I have things I need to do…”

Ezra sagged against the banister, relief at hearing his wife’s voice vying with a renewed surge of worry. _Good Lord, she sounds so weak…_

“From the looks of it you’ve been doing entirely too much!”   Mary’s voice was quiet but still reproving. “And you did not ‘just overheat’, and you know it. You are staying in that bed, Juliet, and that’s final.”

“Ah can’t stay in bed for two weeks!” He could hear the frustration in her voice. “Ezra will be back this evenin’, ah have to be fine by then…” There was a sudden uncomfortable silence, then a small gasp.   “Oh no, you _didn’t_ …”

Ezra stepped into the room before Mary could respond. His wife was lying propped up by multiple pillows in the middle of their big feather bed, her delicate face almost as white as the lace-trimmed nightgown she was wearing. He was at her side in two quick steps, his hand shaking as he reached out to gently caress her pale, overwarm cheek. “Juliet darlin’, what happened?”

“Nothing!”   Frustration was quickly edging toward tears. “Ah’ll be fine, Ezra, just fine. They shouldn’t have worried you.”

He smiled gently down into her eyes, his own vision blurring slightly.   “Ah wouldn’t have forgiven them if they hadn’t, ” he said huskily, sitting down beside her on the bed. “Now tell me why ‘nothin’ has them wantin’ you to rest for two weeks.”

“Because she’s worn herself out,” Mary answered, frowning.   “Trying to do too much in this heat without taking into consideration her already delicate condition—which is no doubt the reason she hasn’t been eating.” She shook an admonishing finger at the younger woman. “You should have said something much sooner.”

Juliet sniffed. “I just…didn’t think it was a good idea to tell everyone, especially since I wasn’t sure anyway, Mary,” she said sincerely if not contritely. “I really did wonder if the way I was feelin’ might just be the heat, or a touch of that flu Mr. Larabee had last month.”

“And it might be either of those, but you had to have known that couldn’t be all there was to it.” To Ezra’s surprise the newspaperwoman smiled sympathetically and patted his wife’s hand. “I know why you didn’t want to tell _everyone_ , honey, but you should have talked to Gloria or I at least; we would have helped you, and then you might not have scared all of us half to death.”   Her cornflower-blue eyes were kind, but determined. “Now are you going to tell him or should I?”

Slender fingers trailed nervously over his brocade vest; Ezra caught the wandering hand, kissed it, and pressed it against his chest, over his heart. “Juliet?”

She sighed, looking worried. “I didn’t want to say anything, I didn’t think it was the right time to tell you, but now…Ezra, I am almost certain that you are goin’ to be a papa.”

Ezra’s mouth fell open. “We’re goin’ to have…” Both women nodded. “When?”

“Sometime after Christmas, I think,” Juliet told him.

“After Christmas,” he repeated softly. “We’re havin’ a baby.”   He started to grin. “We’re havin’ a baby!”

Juliet visibly relaxed, sinking deeper into her pillows. “You should tell Josiah first,” she said with a tired smile. “I wish ah could see the look on his face.”

“Your wish is my command,” he replied. “Mrs. Travis, would you mind fetchin’ Mr. Sanchez for me?”

Mary smiled. “Not at all, Mr. Standish,” she said, standing up and shaking the wrinkles out of her skirt. “I’ll go find him now.”

Once she was gone, Ezra leaned over and gave his wife a gentle kiss.   “And I thought I couldn’t be any happier,” he said, stroking a curl of ebony hair away from her face. His expression suddenly became grave again.   “Juliet, ah’m so sorry; this wouldn’t have happened if I’d been…”

“Shh.” She pressed a slender finger against his lips and shook her head. “Ezra, you had every reason to be upset after what happened. You didn’t do anything wrong!”

“Ah didn’t notice mah wife pushin’ herself into a state of collapse,” he replied bitterly.   “Ah didn’t notice you hadn’t been eatin’.”

Her hand moved up to cup the side of his face; he leaned into her touch with a groan. “Ah didn’t let you. Ah didn’t want you to worry.”

“Ah want to worry,” he told her seriously, turning his head to kiss her palm, his green eyes intense. “Ah even enjoy it.”

“Oh, Ezra…” He pulled her into his arms, feeling warm tears against his neck. “Ah’m sorry, Ezra.”

“If ah can’t be, neither can you,” he whispered. “We’re both too stubborn for our own good, you know.”   He felt more than heard her next words, and he smiled and tightened his embrace. “Ah love you, too, Juliet. Everything will be just fine now, ah’m certain of it.”

 

Vin and JD had ridden into town only half a horse-length behind Ezra , and they’d been close enough to see him hesitate before entering the house. In fact Vin had winced to see it, even though he’d halfway expected it. “He was runnin’ from Miz Maude the last time he used that door,” the tracker reminded JD when the younger man expressed his puzzlement. “She was gonna kill him and he knew it; I think he might have fallen off the porch half on purpose, to throw off her aim. I bet he ain’t been in the front part of the house again this whole time.”

“Damn, I hadn’t thought of that. And I had wondered why he hadn’t been sittin’ on the porch lately.” JD whistled softly, shaking his head. “I’m gonna put Orpheus in his stable, Vin. You goin’ in after Ez?”

“No – and don’t you go in either,” Vin warned. “Give them a little time.”

JD nodded, understanding that, and dismounted so he could take care of Ezra’s horse. Vin rode back to the livery and dropped off his own horse for the stablehands to take care of, then strode across the dusty street to the church. Inside the old adobe it was cool and dim and peaceful, but Vin could feel the unrest all but radiating off the older man sanding down a pew near the pulpit. “You tryin’ to smooth it down or whittle it into a chair?” he asked.

Josiah started to glare at him, then grimaced instead and gave the pew one final scrape before standing up. “You’re back.”

“You knew we would be.” Vin wasn’t glaring either, but his jaw was set and his voice held a cutting edge. “You knew he would be, the minute he knew somethin’ was wrong, Preacher, so there was no call for what you told JD about makin’ sure he came back. Ez damn near fell off his horse when he heard that.” He took a step closer. “I’d just been talkin’ to him, got him to see how he’d been actin’ lately and he was all tore up over it. He said neither one of them had been sleepin’ good, Miz Julie’d been havin’ nightmares too – but she wasn’t talkin’ to him about it any more than he’d been talkin’ to her.”

“He should have asked.” There was a distinct edge to the big preacher’s tone, but Vin could see now that the anger wasn’t directed at Ezra. Josiah made a face, obviously seeing it himself.   “ _I_ should have asked.   Both of them.”

“Maybe they neither one would have talked to you either,” Vin told him. “JD asked Miz Julie, you know. All she’d tell him was that it had been horrible and she thought it would take a while for everyone to get over it. And Ez got over it in a hurry once I talked to him, let me tell you. You can’t tell me he didn’t after seein’ the way he half-killed his horse gettin’ back to town.”   He gave the older man a meaningful look. “I’ve seen him ride that way once before, tryin’ to get to Miz Julie.”

Josiah winced. He remembered that horrible ride from the previous summer, hot on the trail of the Baxter sisters and their gang of outlaws, and what was left of his anger drained away to leave only the sick, churning dregs of his fear over the day’s earlier incident behind. He gave a half-hearted scrape to the pew. “That was the last time I had to carry her too, you know.”

“Yeah.” Vin didn’t think any of them were ever going to forget what had happened that hot June day, but he really didn’t want to chew it over right now. Right now they needed to be talking about how to help Ezra, and the tracker had a few ideas about how that should go. “I told JD to stay out of the house for right now, give the two of them a little time,” he said. “But I’m thinkin’ that after a while…well, Ez might be needin’ you, Preacher. I’m pretty sure he’s ready to talk about it now, if you’re able to listen.”

“Sounds like you already got that one started for me,” was Josiah’s answer. He put down his scraper and stood up, brushing dust and shavings off his pants.   Pale blue eyes squinted at the younger man thoughtfully, and the big preacher smiled. “Thank you, Brother Vin. Are you goin’ back over to the house?”

Vin shook his head. “Not a good idea to have too many of us crowdin’ around over there. I’m gonna go tell Chris what’s goin’ on, I’ll be at the saloon if you need me.”

Josiah accepted that with a nod and the younger man left, sliding out of the dim church into the bright sunlight as silently as any Indian.   “Sometimes, brother,” he said to the door that had closed behind the tracker, “I think you’re better at my job than I am.”

 

Ezra sat with his wife until she fell asleep, and then he continued to sit there in a fog of shock. He was going to be a father, again.

And his wife, the mother-to-be, was sick. Again.

He was still there, crying silently into one of the piled pillows, when Mary Travis came back with Josiah. The big preacher felt his heart sink as he looked at the pitiful sight, and his own eyes were suspiciously bright when the two of them made their way back downstairs so as not to disturb either Ezra or Juliet. “You’re sure?” he asked the newspaperwoman.   “You’re _sure_ it’s not influenza?”

“As sure as I can be.” Mary twisted her hands together helplessly. She knew Juliet had wanted to tell him herself, but... “She's pregnant, Mr. Sanchez." His eyes widened, and she put her hand on his arm. "She wasn't sure, and after what happened last month she didn't feel like she should say anything until she was."

"And she wouldn't have known she needed to be careful in the heat, it would never even have occurred to her," he mused, more to himself than to Mary. An unfortunate side-effect of Juliet being from the future was that there were a lot of considerations regarding living in their current time that she just wasn't aware of. Josiah sighed. "And we still haven't heard anything from Nathan."

Mary grimaced. The influenza outbreak had been ravaging the entire area, and when word came that it had hit the Seminole village Nathan had gone to offer what help he could. Unfortunately the healer wouldn’t dare come back to town until the outbreak had passed, and no one in town could risk going out to the village to get him for fear of bringing the sickness back with them. “What are we going to do, then?”

Josiah shook his head again. “I don’t know, Sister. I just don’t know.”

“J-Josiah?” Ezra was standing on the stairs, red-eyed, looking lost.   “You don’t know…what, exactly?”

“We’re tryin’ to figure out what to do next, son,” Josiah told him. “You know we can’t send for Nathan.”

Ezra came the rest of the way down the stairs. “Then what can we do? We have to…we have to do somethin’, we can’t just…” He swallowed, looking sick, then staggered over to the nearest chair and dropped into it, burying his face in his hands. “We can’t just let mah Juliet die.”

Mary started to say something, but Josiah silenced her with a shake of his head. He moved to the gambler’s side, resting a large hand cautiously on the man’s trembling shoulder. “She won’t die, son. It's just heatstroke...”

The shoulder under his hand trembled even more as the gambler shook his head. “Christina almost did with P-patrick. And that was just…was just a summer cold!” Ezra’s head came up, reddened green eyes desolate and brimming with guilt. “Ah can’t remember what Rosa May did, Josiah!”

The preacher’s eyes widened; he dropped to one knee beside Ezra and shook him. “Son, that’s it! Rosa May!” Ezra looked at the older man blankly, and Josiah shook him again.   “Ezra, _Rosa May_ would remember, wouldn’t she?”

“She would?” Hope dawned in the bleak green eyes. “She would! Josiah, we need to…”

“Send a wire to Rosa May,” Josiah finished. He held Ezra down in the chair when he would have risen and gained his own feet instead. “No, I’ll go; you stay here with Julie. I’ll wait for the response to come through.”

Ezra shrugged out from under the restraining hand and stood, looking up into Josiah’s face. He looked so lost, so frightened…without hesitation the preacher pulled him into his arms and held on tight, one callused hand stroking the back of the brown head soothingly; he smiled as he felt the younger man’s arms wrap around him and hang on with a desperate, trembling grip. “Son, it’s going to be all right,” he murmured. “Everything’s going to be all right.”

 

Josiah ended up staying at the house, unwilling to leave Ezra alone.   It was Mary who sent the message and brought back the reply, and Gloria Potter was right behind her carrying a basket. “You were right, Rosa May knew exactly what to do,” Mary told the worried men, handing over the telegram. “Gloria brought everything we’ll need.”

“Much obliged, Mrs. Potter,” Ezra said distractedly, poring over the telegraph. “Ah see she also said to keep Nathan and his concoctions as far from mah wife as possible, and she’ll be sendin’ more instructions shortly.” He put a hand up to his forehead, closing his eyes briefly in relief.   “Thank the Lord for Rosa May.”

Gloria looked pointedly at Mary and Josiah, who both nodded their understanding. Josiah gently pushed Ezra back down into his chair, still clutching the yellow telegram, and Mary hurried to put on water for tea while the storekeeper began preparing what she’d need to follow Rosa May’s instructions. Gloria would never say it out loud, but she was secretly relieved that Nathan Jackson was out of town and couldn’t be sent for; the healer would doubtless have insisted on forcing Juliet to drink one of the herbal ‘concoctions’ he’d been using to combat the influenza outbreak—which, if she’d understood Rosa May’s reasoning correctly, would have had disastrous results. And one more disaster was the last thing anyone in the Standish family needed.   Ezra and Juliet had had more than their share already.

 

Ben Cartwright had standing orders at the telegraph office in Carson City; if any telegrams arrived from Four Corners, he was to be notified without delay. It wasn’t strictly legal for him to demand this – or for the telegraph operator to comply with it, either – but he was Ben Cartwright and the telegraph operator understood the reason behind the order, so what Ben wanted was what was made to happen.

The man himself came riding into town not two hours after Rosa May had received the message from Mary Travis. One of Ben’s most trusted hands rode beside him, packed saddlebags and bedroll indicating that he was prepared for more than just a ride into town. Ben sent the man to the stage office while he went along to the boarding house. His knock at the back kitchen door was perfunctory, and then he stepped inside, taking off his hat as he did so. Rosa May was sitting at the kitchen’s worktable with a handkerchief in one hand and a pen in the other, writing out what looked like a telegram, and Effie, one of the other owners of the boarding house, was trying to help her while the other, Sally Ann, was working at the stove. “Rosa May,” Ben said when she looked up at him. “You ready to go?”

The older woman just looked at him, her eyes suspiciously red. “Mistah Cartwright, whatevah are you doin’ here?”

“I came to get you. You’re going to Four Corners on the next stage,” he said. He had to smile when Effie clapped a hand to the round ‘o’ of her mouth and Sally froze in mid-stir over her steaming pot. “I already sent Rolf Jameson over to get the tickets settled with the stationmaster, he’s going with you. He’s a good man, I figure those boys in Four Corners could most likely use his help while your Ezra is concerned with his wife. Now where’s your bag, that stage won’t wait forever.”

Rosa May stood up, slowly, the pen falling onto the telegraph blank. “But ah can’t just leave…”

Ben closed the distance between them in two steps and took her plump shoulders in his work-roughened hands. “I told you, last year, that if your Ezra ever needed you I would see that you got there,” he said. “Blood or not, Rosa May, he’s your boy and you should be with him. He needs you. Now go get your things thrown into that bag or by God I’ll throw you over my shoulder and _carry_ you to that stage!”

“Come on, Rosa May, I’m helpin’ you pack – the state you’re in, you’d have nothin’ that made sense in that bag when you got there.” Effie tugged the still-shocked woman out from under Ben’s grip and then pulled her up the back kitchen stairs. “We’ll be right down, Mistah Cartwright, don’ you be goin’ nowhere.”

“I won’t be.” He smiled ruefully at Sally Ann, who was alternately chuckling and crying into her pot. “My apologies for bursting in, Sally Ann,” he told her. “Are you and Effie going to be all right while she’s gone?”

“We done tol’ her we’d be jus’ fine,” the black woman told him, swiping at her eyes. “She’s jus’ plain stubborn, Rosa May is – wouldn’ hear of us sendin’ for you no mattah what we said. You a regulah angel straight from de Lord, Mistah Cartwright, an’ ah’m sure and for certain He’s gonna be smilin’ down upon you for this.”

Ben smiled again, shaking his head. “He already did, Sally Ann, when he sent Rosa May to us last year – Joseph wouldn’t have survived if it wasn’t for her. I’m just paying my debt off in kind.”

 

Ben Cartwright wasn’t the only one who had orders that he should be notified if anything went wrong in Four Corners. Three days after Ezra had come thundering into town on Orpheus, Charlie Corielle rode in at a slightly more sedate pace on his magnificent chestnut stallion Zombie. He stopped off at the Standish house first, then made his way to the saloon. “Jess can’t leave the ranch right now, so he sent me,” he told Chris, Vin and JD, who had been surprised to see him walk in. “I’ll be taking over Ezra’s peacekeeping duties until Juliet doesn’t need him at home anymore.”

He was telling, not asking, but none of the men present resented that. “Everything okay at the ranch?” Chris wanted to know.

Charlie shrugged. “Okay enough that I could come, but not so okay that Jess can too.” He dropped into the chair Chris kicked out for him with a tired sigh. “It just about killed him, not being able to come – even just not being able to come with me. And he was scared to death she or Ezra’d catch the flu when he heard it was going around before. Even where we’re from, the flu is still a total bitch. There’s a dozen different kinds and no cure for any of them. We’d kind of hoped that Juliet would turn out to just be immune, they’d made some advances since our time.”

“I asked her about that, when the influenza first hit Eagle Bend,” JD told him. “She said they’d come up with some kind of shot you could get that was supposed to make you less able to get sick, but that a lot of the time the shot gave you the sickness instead of keeping it off you – even though you didn’t get it bad enough to die from that way.” He shrugged. “She also said that they usually didn’t have enough to go around, so only the older folks and sick folks and people who worked in hospitals or for the government were able to get the shot anyway. Sounded like everybody else pretty much took their chances, just like us.”

“That sucks, but I guess it makes sense,” Charlie said, taking the glass Inez brought him and thanking her with a smile. “If your doctor gets sick, then there’s nobody around to take care of anyone else. And if someone is already weak…” He shook himself and didn’t finish that sentence. “Ezra said Juliet is doing just fine, thanks to Rosa May’s instructions, and they’re one-hundred percent positive now that she doesn’t have the flu. He looks like crap, though. Does anyone know when Rosa May will get here in the flesh?”

Chris poured him a healthy shot of whiskey from the bottle that had been sitting on the table. “Any time now. Ben Cartwright sent JD a telegram, I guess he put Rosa May on the fastest stage he could get hold of and sent one of his hands with her to make sure she didn’t have any problems.” He topped off his own glass. “She couldn’t make it to the wedding because she was taking care of him and his boys, he figured he owed her one.”

“I’ve heard of him. He has a big ranch called the Ponderosa, right?” Charlie smiled into his glass before tossing back half of the contents. “He’s a good man, by all accounts. Guess this proves them right.”

“I haven’t heard anything bad about him,” Chris agreed. He shifted in his seat. “You stopped off at the house and talked to Ez in person, then?”

“Stopped there first,” the other man confirmed. “He’s holding it together about as well as I’d expect. Thanked me about six times for coming to help, poor guy.”

“He was probably a mite surprised you didn’t ride in gunning for him,” Vin said, toying with his own glass. “Man blames himself for what happened, he expects everyone else to do the same.”

“Jess and I understand what betrayal can do to a person,” Charlie answered, shaking his head. “Kind of pulls the rug out from underneath you for a while – and the closer the betrayer was to you, the bigger that rug is. I’d say having your mother hook up with someone who’s trying to kill your wife and then shoot you herself amounts to a pretty big stretch of rug, wouldn’t you?” He set down his glass slowly and deliberately, his brown eyes narrowing. “Do any of you boys blame him?”

“No,” Chris answered immediately. “We don’t – be pretty stupid if we did, to my way of thinkin’. A few of the busybodies in town tried to start some talk, but Mrs. Potter shut that down before any of us had to get involved.” He grinned into his glass. “I do not ever want that woman mad at _me_ , and that’s a fact.”

Charlie made a show of slouching back in his chair, and although the watchful look didn’t quite leave his eyes he did grin back. “So everything’s okay?”

“Everywhere but at Ezra’s house, yeah.” Vin tossed back what was left in his glass and then set it down, waving off a refill. “Josiah says they can’t hardly get Ez to sleep, he’s so afraid to take his eyes off Miz Julie even for a second.”

“You can’t lose one wife without bein’ afraid you’ll lose the next one too,” Chris commented, making a face of his own. “Ezra’s been worried like that since before they got married, so he’s livin’ in his own worst nightmare now.”

Charlie sighed. “This was just damn bad timing all the way around.” He cocked a questioning eyebrow. “Will Rosa May be able to get through to him?”

It was Chris’s turn to chuckle, and the mood at the table lightened considerably. “You’d better believe it,” he said. “We’re just waitin’ for her to get here.”

 


End file.
